|
[Letter of Francis William Newman to Dr. Chapman] 7 PVE. NW, Dear Sir, My article, by your account, is much shorter than I was aware. I altered the opening & another part, expressly to shorten it, as I feared it was too long. Yet I afterwards thought the change, on independent grounds, to be an improvement. I am very willing now to enlarge it as you wish, if only I can see how to do it, & feel my own competence, as to which I am sincerely timid. To do what you request may perhaps improve the article; but it may also damage it much, and precisely open a vulnerable point to attack. But I am not sure that I understand what you mean by "analyzing the enactment of the last one or two Sessions." To analyze a single act of Parliament is elaborate & tedious, and I should blunder endlessly in the attempt: you cannot mean, to take them in detail. To classify them, and remark upon them in classes, is what I think you perhaps mean. I have given a list of Private Bills taken (as a single specimen) from one page which describes the work at the beginning of the session. (To take them thus by chance is fairer than to pick them.) This seems to me to speak for itself, & I cannot think that any one who does not here understand my general principle, would better understand if I could go into the details of these bills. If the distinction between acts intended to aid or check ministers and acts intended as permanent laws can possibly be obscure to any one, I suppose I shall find no difficulty in drawing up from the proceedings of last Session (I have no documents concerning the former Sessions, as the Parliamentary Remembrancer is a new work) a list of each kind: but unless there is some obscurity (of which I have not been aware) in my sentences, which ought to be removed, I at present think such a list rather superfluous. This perhaps you may say,—that many people need to dwell on a generalization, however clearly it be expressed; & that any such lists, detain their minds awhile, & hinder the short sentence that contained the general principle from slipping away too quickly. If this would at all meet your wishes, I will try to do it as well as I am able. If I have not yet hit on your meaning, I fear I must trouble you to explain it more exactly— I am Sincerely yours,
P.S. In one way or other, I can manage, I suppose, to dwell on & amplify this part of the subject. Possibly this might nearly supply the want which you feel.
|